An Update on the DotNetNuke Experiment. . .

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I’d started experimenting with the ASP.Net Framework called DotNetNuke. I’ve been having fun experimenting with the various settings and core modules, and so far, it appears to be living up to all the good press I’ve read.

I think the most amazing thing to me, is that despite its sophistication and advanced design, it’s incredibly easy to administer. How do I know that? Simple really, my wife, while a solid computer ‘user’ is by no means a programmer or system administrator type.

I set up the portal for her pet forum, made some very fundamental administrative settings and set her up to be the Admin of her portal. Yes I added in the various modules I purchased or downloaded, but she’s done all the configuration and content work that makes the site look, and feel, the way it does.

No manual really, she just followed the menus, would ask me a question or two, but all in all, she’s handled everything. I’ve also set up my family page, and have succeeded in getting three of my siblings to drop in and register. Today I added a photo gallery, complete with sub galleries for each member, in about 30 minutes!

I can’t remember if I’ve told you which additional modules I’ve purchased, so here they are:

Active Forums from ActiveModules. This is a very nicely done forum that will be familiar to anyone who’s used a PHP based Forum recently.

I also purchased a one year subscription at Ventrian Systems. This is Scott McCulloch’s site. Scott sells all 9 of his modules, 2 skins and a couple of components for a one time $35/year charge.

Extremely reasonable ‘eh?... and I was able to integrate his private messaging system with the forum module in about 30 minutes. In that time I received no less than 2 emails from Scott, and, he went by the site to check that I had the settings right. That kind of service is pretty rare these days, especially in the computer biz.

It doesn’t hurt that Scott is also on the DNN core development team, so he really knows his way around the framework as well.

I plan on buying a couple of ‘skin packs’ to allow me to improve the look and feel of my professional sites, and a utility to allow me to back up the entire installation so I can move it to a new provider when I’m ready.

I’m also hopeful, that when I finally get started on this ‘idea’ project we can model it after the ‘module’ approach for DNN and utilize the framework as the core of the system. That way, when we do go commercial with the product, we can let the open source community continue to improve the framework, and we can focus on the actual application functionality.

If you’re toying with the idea of building your own website, want something very stable, easy to administer and don’t want to write any code… I suggest you take a look at this product!!

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One other thing... it's a year ago today that I started 'counting' visitors... as of this morning there have been a little over 11,000 visits and slightly more that 22,000 page views. I remain surprized, and honored, that so many folks stop in... but the truth is if I only got 10 visits a day, and everyone of them were from you folks who take the time to leave me a comment... I'd be equally surprized, and honored! I'm happy to have the traffic, I'm thankful to those of you who take a moment out of your day to let me know what you're thinking!!

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I’m going back to my yard work! I hope you’re all having a great weekend!!

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